"I really wish you would undo some of this rope," said the prisoner, who, like Byron's Corsair, seemed to be a mild-mannered man. "I have been tied up ever since two o'clock, and am numb all over. I couldn't run a step if I should try."
"Don't you believe a word of that!" exclaimed Silas. "Come away from there and let that rope be, I tell you."
"Say, father," said Joe, suddenly, "what are you going to do with your captive? Do you intend to sit up and watch him all night long?"
"I was just a studying about that when you come up and scared me," replied Silas, dropping the butt of his gun to the ground, and leaning heavily upon the muzzle.
He never could stand alone for any length of time; he always wanted something to support him.
"What do you think I had better do about it? I don't much like to keep him here, 'cause—Why just look a here, Joey," added Silas, moving up to the door, and pointing to some object inside the cabin. "See them tools I took away from him?"
The boys stepped to their father's side, and saw lying upon the table, where Silas had placed it, a belt containing a brace of heavy revolvers and a murderous-looking knife.
"Now, them's dangerous," continued Silas, "and if this feller's pardner should happen along—"
"But he won't happen along," interrupted Dan. "Brierly's squad gobbled him."
The ferryman looked surprised, then disgusted, and finally he turned an inquiring glance upon Joe, who said that Dan told the truth.